Hardly the victory march some will expect, I suspect The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 will
surprise audiences unfamiliar with Suzanne Collins’ books with its glum,
mournful approach. It’s a typical sci-fi dystopian setup involving an opulent
fascistic regime controlling a population through violence and the common
people rising up in rebellion. But what makes this concluding feature so potent
and satisfying is the way it eschews easy moral binaries and the temptation to
turn in a rousing finale of action and comeuppances. No, Mockingjay – Part 2 picks up where the previous feature left off, with
the rebellious Districts of Panem preparing to invade the Capitol and depose
evil President Snow (Donald Sutherland), and finds in the toil and terror of
revolution only destruction and pain. It sits with our heroes and asks if their
entire struggle was worth it. A quietly radical conclusion has us root for
unrest and upheaval, and then explore the difficulties of putting a society
back together, especially for those who blew it all up.
This is a series that’s gotten slightly better each time
out, not because the overall quality has improved dramatically, but because it has
complicated its character’s ideas and emotions. Now that we have all four films
we can see the complete picture, a dim, cynical allegory with a glimmer of hope
in the end. Our protagonist, Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence, fusing
determination and uncertainty in one of her best performances), started as a
pawn of the Capitol in their Hunger Games, a propaganda tool, gladiatorial combat
to keep the masses intimidated and entertained. But, with her games partner,
Peeta (Josh Hutcherson), she managed to escape certain death in the arena, and
in the process sparked a growing rebellion that soon conscripted her to be their symbol. How rare to see a hero who
is confused about her role, who recognizes and bristles at her lack of control,
and yet continues to struggle to do what’s right.
As Mockingjay – Part 2
begins, rebel leaders (Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman) allow Katniss to
head to the front lines of the assault on the Capitol as part of a propaganda
squad. With her old friend Gale (Liam Hemsworth), a kind-but-tough commander (Mahershala
Ali), and team of soldiers (including Sam Claflin and Natalie Dormer), their
job is to follow behind the fighting, inspiring the troops, and scaring the
Capitol citizens, with video reports. Unfortunately, Snow has ordered the
Gamesmakers to spread traps throughout the city, turning a bombed-out urban
setting – all grey pockmarked rubble and dirt – into an even more twisted
Hunger Games. This is how the action proceeds, the team picking through a
minefield of deadly contraptions while working their way to Snow, the man they
want to assassinate to end the war, bringing a new, and hopefully better,
government to Panem.
Screenwriters Peter Craig and Danny Strong smartly keep the
focus on our characters, allowing most of the epic battle to take place off
screen through suggestion. The violence we see isn’t the massive depersonalized
clashes of CG armies. It’s up close, panicked, sweating, sudden. Horror movie
mechanics are used to spring traps – like automatic weapons, oil slicks, and
mindless sewer mutants – with jump scares jolting firefights and foot chases
into action. Between flashes of chaos, director Francis Lawrence (who has
capably, artfully helmed three of the four Hunger
Games) uses stillness and quiet, as characters catch their breath, debate
strategy, and let the traumatic events stop ringing in their ears, if only for
a little while. There’s dread everywhere, not only in the probing close-ups,
which capture every bit of fear and doubt, but in the sense that all this
fighting may be futile.
This has always been a series that’s both action-oriented
and deeply disturbed by violence. From the shaky-cam elisions of the first Games and the brutal executions of Catching Fire to the bruising civilian
uprisings in the first Mockingjay (the series' high point),
it’s a franchise the looks at bloodshed with great sadness, keenly aware of
cycles of trauma, fear mongering, propaganda, and war. It treats even the enemy
as people, this last film finding fleeing Capitol citizens and viewing them
with compassion. What started as a satire of reality TV and conspicuous
consumption has become a war zone, with refugees fleeing both rebel bombings
and oppressive government retaliations. (Real world echoes are impactful and
messy.) The violence of the Hunger Games becomes the violence of revolution.
It’s a movie too engaged with its tragic elements to create action scenarios
full of mindless villains to slaughter. Every kill is felt. The cast
convincingly inhabits characters who are exhausted by the chaos, and throw
themselves into it anyway.
Where will it stop? And if it does, how will Katniss ever
feel normal again? Her nightmares are getting worse. Her sense of purpose is
the only thing keeping her moving forward. But it’s hard to tell who has her
best interests at heart – one old ally has been brainwashed; others may just as
soon allow her to be martyred for their cause. Worse still is the question of
whether what’s best for Katniss and what’s best for Panem are or can be one and
the same. It doesn’t stop with defeating Snow. Revolution is hard enough.
Filling the power vacuum that follows it will be harder. Here’s a movie actually
interested in contemplating these tough questions, and in a slick, pop
blockbuster package that’ll draw big crowds to see this four-part story wrapped
up. It takes gut-wrenching twists, and allows time to slowly contemplate howls
of sorrow and confusion. That it doesn’t find easy answers, and leaves an
unsettled feeling lingering in a dénouement of tenuous hope, is to its credit.
